DoJ Settles Suit Alleging White Male
Discrimination

November 18, 2004 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - The US
Department of Justice (DoJ) has settled a discrimination suit
brought by white male applicants to immigration judge posts
who feel that they were discriminated against in the
mid-1990s.

>The settlement is the result of a suit that started
with an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC)
complaint filed in 1996 by a Texas lawyer who claimed that
he was denied a job as an immigration judge because he was
a white male, according to The National Law Journal (NLJ).

>In 2002, the case was certified as a class action,
with the plaintiffs alleging that the DoJ hired a record
number of immigration judges in 1994-1995, but that
affirmative action policies unduly hurt their chances at
being hired.

>The payment of $11.5 million to 550 white male
applicants to immigration court is seen by some analysts as
a warning to other agencies that race-based hiring
practices are not to be allowed, according to NLJ. Although
it denied any wrongdoing and refused comment, the DoJ, some
think, is alerting other agencies to the fact that
affirmative action can apply to education but to not much
else.

>Almost $4 million of the total settlement in
Durnford v. Ashcroft will go towards legal fees, according
to the NLJ.